This blog is an addition to the Beaver Creek Storytellers webpage http://bristolstorytellers.weebly.com We will discuss performances by our group, post pictures, and keep viewers up to date on storytelling issues, both local, regional, and national.

Sunday, October 10, 2010

Back At It

My life has taken a different turn since I last wrote. My husband, Rocky Rockwell, entered the hospital mid-March and passed away on May 11. I have not felt like doing any storytelling or keeping this blog up to date.

However, five months later, I'm beginning to feel the urge to get involved again so am planning to do a few events yet this year. I also intend to start posting once again to this blog. I'll begin by saying a few things about Rocky who was a founding member of the Beaver Creek Storytellers. I believe Rocky had been a storyteller all of his life. When I met him in 1974, I knew him as a first-rate conversationalist and teller of anecdotes, usually over a restaurant dinner table. On car trips, he would entertain me with tales of his past experiences in school and the newspaper business from which he had retired shortly before we met. We moved to Bristol in 1982 when Rocky got a job as a professor at Virginia Intermont College. We had never even heard of the Jonesborough Storytelling Festival until 1987 when friends came to visit; one of them had read something about it in a newspaper. She and I drove to Jonesborough to check it out and in the first tent we visited we heard Donald Davis. We were hooked and excited to share news of this fun activity when we got home and told our husbands. Rocky and I started attending the Jonesborough storytelling festival every year. We began to learn about its organization and other storytelling organizations. In 1996 we went to a storytelling event at a Jonesborough restaurant and by the end of that year we had joined lhe Jonesborough Storytellers Guild, a small local group that told stories once a week at the restaurant we had attended. Storytelling woke up our creativity and soon we were both writing and telling stories on stage. A year later, Rocky, G. Lee Hearl, and I started the Beaver Creek Storytellers in Bristol. Rocky's passion for the Art of Story continued and he became a member of the Board for the National Storytelling Network and later for the Tennessee Storytelling Association. He was a featured teller for the Corn Island Festival in Lexington, KY; the Blueberry Festival, and the Great Oaks Festival in Mississippi; Sharing The Fire in Boston; and several other festivals and conferences in Tennessee, Virginia, and Alabama. Unfortunately, in 2004 Rocky was diagnosed with lung cancer and although he was cured it left him with severe COPD which, with other health problems that occurred, led to his death this year. With his illness, his passion for story waned, but it was never fully extinguished, and he was always ready to "talk story" when we hosted a visiting storyteller. I'll finish this by telling a little anecdote about Rocky's last month. He was in a nursing home following his hospital stay, and one beautiful day the end of April, he felt good enough to get into a wheelchair and let me push him outside to breathe in some sunshine and fresh air. We discovered a little garden and about 8 people were sitting grouped together in a small pavilion. Some were patients and some were nurses aides. I pushed him into an empty spot and then began introducing ourselves and soon I was asking and answering questions. Rocky was clearly enjoying it all, but was not feeling up to talking. However, after a short while he leaned over to me and in a low voice said, "With another couple people, we'd have an audience." That was our last delightful day.

Beaver Creek Storytellers will miss Rocky's ability to think clearly to solve problems, to be innovative, and to be a kind critic. Most of all, I believe they will miss his clever stories, all original, many of them humorous, but others touching the heart strings. Favorites were "The Hurricane," "The Last Shot Of the Civil War," "The Long White Shark," "JFK and The Camera," "The Adoption Story," "Jackie Mitchell," and "Old Age."

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NEXT PERFORMANCE

Next performance will be Thursday, July 7 at the 606 State Street Gallery in downtown Bristol. 7:00 p.m. Admission: $5.00 Adults

Followers

UPCOMING PERFORMANCES AT 606 STATE ST. GALLERY

First Thursday of Month at 7:00 p.m.

Feb. 3

March 3

April 7

May 5

June 2

July 7

August 4

September 1

October 6

November 3

December 1

BCS Bits & Pieces

Welcome! You can read my latest posts by using Blogspot or on my profile page on Facebook (Irma Rockwell)or on the profile page of the group administered by me "Beaver Creek Storytellers." You can sign up to learn the latest about the Beaver Creek Storytellers (BCS) by checking the box or text that says "Follow This Blog" or "Follow with Google Friend Connect." This will alert you to new information that has been posted.

The wizardry of HTML through the App "Networked Blogs" allows what I write on Blogspot to instantly appear on Facebook.

BCS is a 14-year old organization with 33 members. The past two years has been a transition time as the older leaders have semi-retired and let the next generation take the lead. We are getting larger audiences, attracting new performers, and becoming more skilled in oral storytelling. Entertainment is our main goal and the communities of Bristol are benefiting.

If you live close enough to come to our appearances, let me know by e-mail or through Facebook and I'll make sure you are notified of upcoming performances.

Upcoming General Meetings

General Meetings begin at 6:30 p.m. at the Bristol Public Library on the third Thursday of month from February through November

March 17

April 21

May 19

June 16

July 21

August 18

September 15

October 20

November 17

BIRTHDAYS FOR 2011

JANUARY

1-20 Leon Overbay

FEBRUARY

2-12 Judy Farlow "Butterfly"

2-22 Mary Grace Walrath

MARCH

3-13 Chris Vickers

3-30 Glen Williams

APRIL

4-1 Diana Conco

4-1 Mimi Rockwell

4-19 Carole Ann Miller

JUNE

6-7 Sam Samuels

6-13 David Claunch

JULY

7-2 Gary Walrath

7-3 Lester "Toon" Murray

7-16 Ron Tittle

AUGUST

8-25 Joyce Moore

8-25 Becky Vickers

SEPTEMBER

9-18 Paul Conco

OCTOBER

10-4 Isaac Freeman

10-11 G. Lee Hearl

DECEMBER

12-6 Pat Musselman

12-8 Wilhelmina Banks

12-27 Sheila Lane

Appalachian and Other American Stories

VIRGINIA FOLK LEGENDS, edited by Thomas E. Barden

THE JACK TALES, Collected and retold by Richard Chase

SOUTHERN JACK TALES by Donald Davis

GRANDFATHER TALES collected and retold by Richard Chase

SWEET LAND OF STORY, Thirty-Six American Tales To Tell by Pleasant DeSpain

Scary Stories In Books and CD's

FAVORITE SCARY STORIES OF AMERICAN CHILDREN by Richard and Judy Dockery Young

SCARY STORIES TO TELL IN THE DARK by Alvin Schwartz

THE COMPLETE WORKS OF EDGAR ALLEN POE

THE WALKING TREES AND OTHER SCARY STORIES by Roberta Simpson Brown

QUEEN OF THE COLD-BLOODED TALES by Roberta Simpson Brown

BEYOND THE GRAVE Ghost Stories and Ballads from the Mountains by Granny Sue (cd)

Uncalled For Tour, March 28, ETSU

Irwin and Lepp

Bil Lepp, March 28

About Me

In another year I will have reached my octogenarian years. In the past three years I have developed some physical difficulties that have lessened my mobility. I am used to being active and now am pretty sedentary but keep myself occupied with writing, reading, and computering.

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Professional Storyteller

The Performing Beaver

MISSION STATEMENT OF THE BEAVER CREEK STORYTELLERS

The Beaver Creek Storytellers of Bristol, Virginia-Tennessee is a non-profit association of storytelling enthusiasts who gather to support the Art of Story. Beaver Creek Storytellers serves the community through the staging of public performances including fund-raising events that benefit other organizations. BCS collects, preserves, and tells stories of the oral tradition of Virginia and Tennessee and shares with their Appalachian audience the stories of diverse cultures within the United States and internationally. The association provides educational opportunities to all storytellers for their professional development that will nurture their creativity, develop their skills, and educate as well as entertain their audience.